Congress eulogizes President Roosevelt, Feb. 9, 1919

On this day in 1919, senators and representatives gathered in the House chamber to pay their respects to Theodore Roosevelt, the nation’s 26th president, who served from 1901 to 1909. He died on Jan. 6 at his home in Oyster Bay, N.Y., at age 60.

After the assassination of Republican President William McKinley in 1901, Vice President Roosevelt, not quite 43, became the youngest president in the nation’s history. Roosevelt brought new excitement to the office as he used strong public support to lead Congress in many domestic reforms.

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Roosevelt died in his sleep after suffering a heart attack, preceded by a 10-week illness diagnosed as inflammatory rheumatism. Despite his declining health, Roosevelt remained active until nearly the end of his life.

Thomas Marshall, the Democratic vice president, said: “Death had to take Roosevelt sleeping, for if he had been awake, there would have been a fight.”

Joining the lawmakers in the chamber were members of the Supreme Court, President Woodrow Wilson’s Cabinet, the diplomatic corps and former President William Howard Taft. At the time, Wilson was in Paris, negotiating the terms of the Versailles Peace Treaty, which concluded World War I.

Henry Couden, the House chaplain, opened the proceedings by remembering Roosevelt as “one of the nation’s noblest sons — a writer, a speaker, a scientist, a patriot, a soldier, a statesman.” In delivering his remarks, Sen. Henry Cabot Lodge (R-Mass.) said, “We cannot approach Theodore Roosevelt’s death along the beaten path of eulogy or satisfy ourselves with the empty civilities of commonplace funeral tributes, for he did not make his life journey over main-traveled roads nor was he ever commonplace.”

Readers' Comments (1)

Too bad if he would be alive today, his own party would disown him - he was for National Parks, and todays repubs are for business only - which wants short-term profit only, long-term consequences be damned